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Staff Profile

Professor Iain Munro

Prof of Leadership & Org Change

  • Email: iain.munro@ncl.ac.uk
  • Telephone: +44 (0) 191 208 1653
  • Address: Newcastle University Business School
    Room 5.05,
    5 Barrack Rd,
    Newcastle upon
    Tyne NE1 4SE
Background

Iain is Professor of Leadership and Organization at Newcastle Business School. He has previously worked at the universities of Warwick (1994-2000), St Andrews (2000-2009), and Innsbruck (2009-2013). He has diverse research interests and has published articles in Organization Studies, Human Relations, Organization, the Journal of the Operational Research Society and the Journal of Business Ethics. He has written a monograph on "Information Warfare in Business: Strategies of Control and Resistance".  

Editorial Positions:

  • Editorial board member of Human Relations
  • Editorial board member of Organization Studies.
  • Associate Editor of Organization  

Google scholar: Click here.

Researchgate: https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Iain-Munro

Research

I am engaged in the following areas of research:

i) Power and Ethics in Organizations
My research into power and ethics in organizations covers a range of topics including codes of ethics, whistleblowing, moral leadership, social movements, and surveillance in organizations. I have also written and published research on the role of power in network organizations and neoliberal techniques of management. I am particularly interested in developing Foucault’s concepts to better understand the power relations entailed by the use of information technologies for ‘post-disciplinary’ forms of controlled surveillance.

ii) Whistleblowing 
I have published a number of articles on the subject of whistleblowing, with a focus on both human rights and power relations. I have co-hosted and presented at several events on whistleblowing with high profile whistleblowers (see below). I am currently working on a book, “New Perspectives on Whistleblowing”, which combines practitioner accounts with rigorous academic analysis, including contributions from whistleblowers and their supporters in the professions of law and journalism. I am on the advisory board of a whistleblower policy NGO, The Parrhesia Institute, run by Ian Foxley (https://parrhesia.org.uk/whos-who/academic-council/). Below are publicly available presentations and panels that I have either hosted or presented on the subject of whistleblowing:

* Organizer and convenor, Newcastle University, May 2019, ‘Whistleblowing, Human Rights and the Media’, speakers including John Kiriakou (CIA whistleblower), Craig Murray (UK Foreign Office whistleblower), Robert Tibbo (Edward Snowden’s lawyer) and Andrew Fowler (Investigative Journalist See https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dEiwXAys2wY

* Co-organizer and speaker, The Shard, London January 2020,  ‘Whistleblowing, Transparency and Activism’,  speakers including Katharine Gun (GCHQ whistleblower), Mark Curtis (National Security historian), Iain Munro, and Professor Kate Kenny. See https://www.whistleblowingimpact.org/10-january-2020-videos-recordings-of-whistleblowing-transparency-and-activism-programme-now-available/

* 'Transformations in Networked Whistleblowing'. The event was hosted by the Oxford University Centre for Corporate Reputation at Oxford, Saïd Business School, March 2020, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hDsrvk7x-fI

* Invited panelist at York University, July, 2020 -  ‘To blow the whistle or not? An online symposium on complicity and compliance in economic and social wrongdoing.”  See https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6julibkYKDA

* Convenor of 'Whistleblowing, Investigative Journalism, Freedom, Democracy and Solidarity', May 2021, speakers   John Kiriakou (CIA whistleblower),  Jeffrey Sterling  (CIA whistleblower),  Chamira Gamage (Amnesty International),  Stephen Rohde (American Civil Liberties Union), Michael Albert, Max Blumenthal, Jimmy Dore, Joe Lauria. See https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GfGiQE1hLrE&t=218s

* Organizer and co-convenor, 'Whistleblowing, human rights and social justice', speakers include Professor Robert Tibbo, Professor David Lewis andProfessor Kate Kenny.  The event was co-hosted on 15th March 2022 by the Newcastle University Business School, the Newcastle University Forum for Human Rights and Social Justice and the Irish Centre for Human Rights. See https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3tHjbU7elPs

* "Julian Assange, state secrecy and cover-ups." The event was hosted by the Labour Party Conference, September, 2022, with  Dr Deepa Driver (legal observer in the Assange case, Haldane Society of Socialist Lawyers). Speakers: Stella Assange (human rights lawyer), Professor Iain Munro (expert on whistleblowers), Craig Murray and Ögmundur Jonasson (the Icelandic minister who refused to aide the FBI in framing Assange).  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0q-Pr3szBgY

* Co-organizer and host of "The emerging role of whistleblowers in democracies" by Professor Robert Tibbo. The event was part of the Newcastle University Insights public lecture series, November, 2022. https://www.youtube.com/watch?app=desktop&v=gSul3KKJvwI&fbclid=IwAR0U9Er1Y4D_O2AxcWrvoY8hATP0ZTV8_u9pPVVXUW_rldDeWbPSJieGHHo#bottom-sheet 


iii) Information Warfare 
I have written a research monograph on ‘Information Warfare in Business’ (Routledge, 2005, 2007 paperback edition). This book develops the idea that information is not simply a tool but is increasingly being used as a weapon and as an object of attack. This book draws upon a range of social theories in order to map out the ways in which information is becoming weaponised in both the corporate world and in military organizations. I have published research on the use of information warfare by organizations involved in the climate change debate, and more recently on the rise of new forms of information warfare in the social media.  I sit on the advisory broad of a joint project with the Finnish military on information warfare in social media (with Professor Aki-Mauri Huhtinen, Finnish Defense University).

iv) The Humanities in Management Studies 
In addition to the previous two key areas of research I am engaged in a variety of related research projects on the use of literature in organization theory and the humanities in organizations. I have published research on the significance of Kafka’s work to understanding power relations in organisations. I am also engaged in research projects on the ethics of social movement organizations, and animal ethics in organizations, among other topics. These research themes are united by a strong ethical focus and the investigation of forces that are constantly escaping attempts to organize them.


 

 

 

Teaching

BUS3054 Strategy, Organizations & Society

BUS3347 Strategy, Organizations & Society (Study Abroad Sem 1)

BUS3017 Corporate Social Responsibility and Ethics

BUS3062 Corporate Communications and Social Media

NBS8556 Core Readings in Management and Business Studies

Publications